Redirecting and mirroring of telephonic communications

ABSTRACT

Initiating a communication is disclosed. An identifier associated with an intended destination with which the calling party desires to establish communication is received from a calling party. Communication with a compliance node is established. An identifier is provided to the compliance node. The compliance node is configured to establish with the intended destination a communication session in which the compliance node, the intended destination, and the calling party are participants.

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION

In many contexts, an enterprise or other stakeholder may be requiredand/or may desire to keep track of and/or exercise control over networkor other communications, e.g., communications among employees of acorporation and/or between such employees and third parties, such as thecorporation's customers and/or members of the general public. Therequirements of the Securities and Exchange Commission, NationalAssociation of Securities Dealers, HIPAA, Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002,and various anti-harassment and anti-discrimination laws are among themany legal and regulatory requirements that may give rise to a need onthe part of a corporation or other entity to be able to monitor, record,archive, index, retrieve, analyze, and/or control employee (or otheruser) communications.

The task of monitoring and controlling voice communications has beenchallenging. Not only has voice communication processing technology beentraditionally limited, voice communication typically involves the use ofcommunication devices and/or infrastructure beyond the control of theresponsible entity. Therefore, there is a need for an effective way tomonitor and/or control voice and other communications, including withoutlimitation communications made using telephonic technology.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

Various embodiments of the invention are disclosed in the followingdetailed description and the accompanying drawings.

FIG. 1 is a block diagram illustrating an embodiment of a system forredirection compliance processing.

FIG. 2A is a flow chart illustrating an embodiment of a process forredirecting a call made to a monitored call participant.

FIG. 2B is a flow chart illustrating an embodiment of a process forredirecting a call made from a monitored call participant.

FIG. 2C is a flow chart illustrating an embodiment of a process fordetermining an identification number to be used in connection with amonitored call.

FIG. 2D is a flow chart illustrating an embodiment of a process forestablishing a call to a destination call number.

FIG. 2E is a flow chart illustrating an embodiment of a process forblocking a caller.

FIG. 3 is a block diagram illustrating an embodiment of a system forcompliance processing.

FIG. 4A is a flow chart illustrating an embodiment of a process forestablishing a call.

FIG. 4B is a flow chart illustrating an embodiment of a process forblocking a call.

FIG. 4C is a flow chart illustrating an embodiment of a process forreceiving a call on a device associated with a monitored callparticipant.

FIG. 5A is a block diagram illustrating an embodiment of a system forcompliance processing in a PBX environment.

FIG. 5B is a block diagram illustrating an embodiment of a system forcompliance processing in a PBX environment, including line monitors.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION

The invention can be implemented in numerous ways, including as aprocess, an apparatus, a system, a composition of matter, a computerreadable medium such as a computer readable storage medium or a computernetwork wherein program instructions are sent over optical or electroniccommunication links. In this specification, these implementations, orany other form that the invention may take, may be referred to astechniques. A component such as a processor or a memory described asbeing configured to perform a task includes both a general componentthat is temporarily configured to perform the task at a given time or aspecific component that is manufactured to perform the task. In general,the order of the steps of disclosed processes may be altered within thescope of the invention.

A detailed description of one or more embodiments of the invention isprovided below along with accompanying figures that illustrate theprinciples of the invention. The invention is described in connectionwith such embodiments, but the invention is not limited to anyembodiment. The scope of the invention is limited only by the claims andthe invention encompasses numerous alternatives, modifications andequivalents. Numerous specific details are set forth in the followingdescription in order to provide a thorough understanding of theinvention. These details are provided for the purpose of example and theinvention may be practiced according to the claims without some or allof these specific details. For the purpose of clarity, technicalmaterial that is known in the technical fields related to the inventionhas not been described in detail so that the invention is notunnecessarily obscured.

Telephonic communication redirection and mirroring is disclosed. In someembodiments, calls to and/or from one or more communication participantsof interest are redirected through a compliance system accessible via atelephonic network, e.g., a telephone/cellular service provider network.A communication participant includes any users, systems, and/or devicesinvolved in a communication. In some embodiments, a compliance system isconfigured to serve as a redirection point for calls associated with acommunication participant of interest, thereby enabling various routingand compliance processing to be performed without necessarily involvinga change in a third party telecommunications service provider's networkor equipment. In some embodiments, data associated with a call in whicha communication participant of interest is a participant is mirrored toa mirror destination node, e.g., for policy or regulatory complianceprocessing.

FIG. 1 is a block diagram illustrating an embodiment of a system forredirection compliance processing. In the example shown, compliancesystem 102 performs routing and compliance processing. Storage 104contains data associated with the compliance system. The data in storage104 may include call archive data, recorded call data, and anyinformation associated with calls. Configuration and policy data and/orsettings may also be stored in storage 104. Monitored call participant106 is one of one or more communication participants associated withcompliance system 102. In some embodiments, all calls to and frommonitored call participant 106 are redirected through compliance system102. Call participant 106 in one embodiment comprises a communicationdevice associated with an employee of a company desiring to performcompliance processing of telephonic communication of its employees.External call participant 108 is one of one or more communicationparticipants that may communicate with monitored call participant 106.More than two call participants can exists, e.g., a conference call with3 or more call participants, and more than one monitored callparticipant may participate in the same call. In the example shown, theexternal call participant 108 is external to the compliance system sincethe call participant is not directly associated with the compliancesystem, e.g., the communication participant does not belong to thecompany desiring to perform compliance processing of monitored callparticipant 106. Only calls involving at least one monitored callparticipant are processed by compliance system 102. In some embodiments,monitored call participant 106 may communicate with another monitoredcall participant associated with compliance system 102. Thecommunication information path lines shown in the figure are merelyschematic. Not all information paths have been shown to clearlyillustrate the embodiment. Information may travel through any path ornetwork and travel through any intermediary node.

In the example shown, monitored call participant 106 has a public callnumber and a non-public call number. The call numbers are used asidentifiers of call participants. A call number may be a telephonenumber, extension number, IP address, and any numeric, alphabetic,alphanumeric or other identifier. In some embodiments, the public callnumber associated with monitored call participant 106 would be providedto one or more external calling parties or users, such as external callparticipant 108, to be used to place a call to the monitored callparticipant 106. In some embodiments, dialing the public call numberassociated with monitored call participant 106 results in a call beingplaced to compliance system 102, which is configured to recognize thecall as being associated with monitored call participant 106 andestablish a three way connection between the calling party (e.g.,external call participant 108), the monitored call participant 106, andthe compliance system 102, e.g., by using the non-public call numberassociated with monitored call participant 106 to conference monitoredcall participant 106 in to the call terminated between external callparticipant 108 and compliance system 102, thereby enabling thecompliance system 102 to monitor and/or control the communicationsbetween external call participant 108 and monitored call participant106. In some embodiments, a calling party includes any user, a hardwarecomponent, or a software component associated with a call participant.

In some embodiments, dialing the public call number associated with themonitored call participant 106 results in a call placed directly to callparticipant 106. Compliance processing is performed either in acompliance processing module of call participant 106 or an externalcompliance system associated with call participant 106. In someembodiments, call participant 106, upon receiving an incoming call,e.g., from an external call participant, first conferences in anassociated compliance system prior to connecting a user associated withcall participant 106 to the call, e.g., by providing a “ring” signal orindication to the user.

In some embodiments, the user of a device associated with monitored callparticipant 106 is not made aware of the non-public call number. In someembodiments, the user associated with monitored call participant 106believes the public call number is the only call number associated withmonitored call participant 106.

In some embodiments, when monitored call participant 106 dials anoutgoing destination call number, a call is established with compliancesystem 102 and the outgoing destination call number is passed to thecompliance system. The compliance system terminates a new call to thepassed destination number and conferences the monitored call participant106 with the terminated new call to the passed destination number. Insome embodiments, telecommunication equipment associated with monitoredcall participant 106, e.g., a mobile or desktop telephone, is configuredto only receive calls to the non-public number from compliance system102 and make direct calls only to compliance system 102. In someembodiments, only one or more authorized call participants may dial theprivate number associated with a monitored call participant in a calland communicate with the associated monitored call participant duringthe call. An attempt to dial the private number in a call by anunauthorized caller may result in the call being blocked or the callbeing unanswered. In some embodiments, monitored call participant 106can only directly dial calls to one or more numbers associated withauthorized call participants. A compliance system may be an authorizedcall participant.

In some embodiments, hardware, firmware, or software may be used tolimit equipment associated with monitored call participant 106 toplacing calls directly to and/or receiving calls at the non-publicnumber from compliance system 102. In some embodiments, hardware,firmware, or software may be used to limit equipment associated withmonitored call participant 106 to placing calls directly to and/orreceiving calls from authorized call participants. In some embodiments,hardware, firmware, or software may be used to cause equipmentassociated with monitored call participant 106 to connect, automaticallyand transparently to the user, a compliance node by conference into acall placed using the equipment. In some embodiments, hardware,firmware, or software may be used to cause equipment associated withmonitored call participant 106 to mirror to a compliance node,automatically and transparently to the user, at least a portion of dataassociated with a call placed using the equipment.

In some embodiments, call requester identifier data (i.e., Caller-IDdata) is modified to allow the call participants to be unaware of thecall redirections, e.g., by sending Caller ID data associated withexternal call participant 108 to equipment associated with monitoredcall participant 106 in connection with the call terminated bycompliance system 102 to monitored call participant 106, e.g., using thenon-public call number associated with monitored call participant 106,to conference monitored call participant 106 in to the call originalterminated between external call participant 108 and compliance system102, e.g., as a result of external call participant 108 dialing thepublic call number associated with monitored call participant 106.

Since compliance system 102 in some embodiments redirects all incomingand outgoing calls for monitored call participant 106, the compliancesystem is able to perform compliance processing on all calls associatedwith monitored call participant 106. In other embodiments, at least aportion of call data may be received by compliance system 102, e.g., bymirroring and/or conferencing as described above, and complianceprocessing is performed on such data.

Any telephonic equipment may be associated with the call participants.For example, the call participants may be associated with mobile phones,telephones, computers, and/or any devices able to send and receivetelephonic data. Any one or a combination of telecommunications networksmay be used to transmit communication between the compliance system andthe call participants, including without limitation, a direct orindirect physical connection, telephone service provider network, mobilecommunication network, public switched telephone network (PSTN),Blackberry network, PBX (Private Branch Exchange, i.e., a privatetelephone network within an enterprise) phone network, Voice-over-IPnetwork, Internet, intranet, LAN, WAN, and/or any other forms ofconnecting two or more systems together. The telephone service providernetwork includes mobile communication network, public switched telephonenetwork (PSTN), Blackberry network, Voice-over-IP network and/or anyother forms of telecommunication network infrastructure. In someembodiments, monitored call participant 106 is configured to communicatewith compliance system 102 by modifying or otherwise configuringfirmware associated with monitored call participant 106 to perform suchcommunication. In one embodiment, a communication policy, i.e. a policyregarding how to establish communication with other call participants,may be established and/or implemented by hardware design or modificationof telecommunications equipment associated with monitored callparticipant 106. In one embodiment, the communication policy may bedetermined by software running on a processor associated with monitoredcall participant 106. Any suitable technique for enabling, determining,configuring, and/or enforcing may be used.

In some embodiments, compliance system 102 includes any componentnecessary to perform redirection and/or compliance processing. One ormore telephonic identifiers, including telephone numbers, extensionnumbers, IP numbers, and numeric, alphabetic or alphanumeric identifier,may be associated with compliance system 102. Storage 104 may be a partof the compliance system or connected to the compliance system togetherthrough a connection or a network. The compliance system and a deviceassociated with a monitored call participant may together comprise asingle device, i.e., in one embodiment a telephone associated with themonitored call participant includes built-in compliance systemprocessing inside the device. In some embodiments, compliance processingperformed in a compliance processing module that is a part of amonitored call participant. In some embodiments, compliance processingis performed in an external compliance processing module connected witha monitored call participant. The external compliance system may notperform call redirection. In some embodiments, the monitored callparticipant only accepts or makes calls if the external compliancesystem approves the call.

Compliance processing may include processing based on at least a portionof the information transferred in the call. Information transferred inthe call may include voice data (including conversation content andtone/character/accent/gender of voice), background call noise, anyaudible data, any binary data, data associated with devices of with callparticipants, data associated with communication service providers, dataassociated with routing devices, and/or data associated with otherdevices associated with the compliance system. Based at least in part onthe information being processed, the calls may be monitored, recorded,indexed, retrieved, analyzed, controlled, blocked, modified, archived,and/or any other processing can be performed. In some embodiments, acall is blocked according to a call blocking policy, e.g., a call isblocked if one of the call participants is not on a list of allowed callparticipants, does not belong to a group of allowed call participants,is an external call participant, is on a list of non-allowed callparticipants, or belongs to a group of non-allowed call participants. Acall may be blocked or modified during a call. For example, in oneembodiment a call is terminated if information that violates a policy isdiscussed, as detected during the call by processing voice datacommunicated during the call, e.g., by detecting a key word or phrase.The blocked or modified call can be archived and reported to appropriateauthorities. Audio data processing is described in greater detail in aU.S. patent application Ser. No. 10/884,453 entitled METHOD AND SYSTEMFOR PROCESSING AUDITORY COMMUNICATIONS filed Jul. 1, 2004.

In some embodiments, all or a portion of information transferred duringa call may be archived. The determination of which transferredinformation portion to archive may be based at least in part on apreconfigured and/or dynamically configured archive policy. The policymay be based at least in part on any of the transferred information.Archiving includes saving transferred information to any storage medium,including hard drives, optical storage, data tape, audio tape, backupserver, and networked storage (e.g., Storage Area Network, NetworkAttached Storage). In some embodiments, the storage may be a part of thecompliance system and/or external to the compliance system. In someembodiments, the storage may be a part of a communication participant ormay be external to the communication participant. Information may beconverted (i.e. audio digitalization, voice to text translation,encoding format conversion, data filtering), compressed, and/orencrypted before being archived. Other compliance processing besidesblocking, modifying, archiving may be performed by the compliancesystem.

FIG. 2A is a flow chart illustrating an embodiment of a process forredirecting a call made to a monitored call participant. The process maybe implemented on compliance system 102 of FIG. 1. At 202, a callassociated with a public number of a monitored call participantassociated with a compliance system is received. In some embodiments,the call is received at a compliance system on a line associated withthe public number, e.g., calls made to the public number ring at and/orotherwise are connected by a telephone service provider to thecompliance system. At 204, a non-public number that can be used toterminate the call to the monitored call participant is determined. At206, the non-public number is used to conference the monitored callparticipant into the call received at 202, which in some embodimentsresults in a three way call being established between a calling stationthat initiated the call received at 202, the compliance system, and themonitored call participant. At 208, compliance processing is performedon the information transferred between the caller and the monitored callparticipant either during the communication or after the communicationsession.

FIG. 2B is a flow chart illustrating an embodiment of a process forredirecting a call made from a monitored call participant. The processmay be implemented on compliance system 102 of FIG. 1. At 209, a callrequest from a monitored call participant is received. For example, themonitored call participant may call the compliance system to establish acall between them. One or more dedicated call numbers for incoming callrequests from monitored call participants may be associated with thecompliance system. In some embodiments, the monitored call participantmay dial a number associated with the compliance system. In someembodiments, the monitored call participant may use a telephoneconfigured to connect to the compliance system regardless of the numberdialed and then pass the dialed digits to the compliance system forfurther processing, e.g., conferencing the dialed number into the calland monitoring the information exchanged between the monitored callparticipant and the destination associated with the dialed number. At210, the destination call participant number (i.e. number dialed by themonitored call participant) is received from the monitored callparticipant. The call number may be passed as a single or a combinationof data encodings, including rotary pulse, DTMF (Dual-ToneMulti-Frequency), and binary data. A connection between the monitoredcall participant and the compliance system may be established at orshortly after the time the number is dialed or a connection between themmay already exist. In some embodiments, a handshake protocol is used toestablish communication. At 212, it is determined whether the dialednumber is a public number associated with a monitored call participantassociated with the compliance system. If dialed number is not a publicnumber associated with a monitored participant, at 214 the dialed numberis used to conference the destination call participant into the callreceived at 209. If it is determined at 212 that the receiveddestination number is a public number associated with a monitoredparticipant, at 216 the destination public number is mapped to anon-public number of the call participant associated with thedestination number. At 218, the non-public number of the callparticipant associated with the destination number is used to conferencethe call participant associated with the destination number into thecall received at 209.

FIG. 2C is a flow chart illustrating an embodiment of a process fordetermining an identification number to be used in connection with amonitored call. In some embodiments, identification number is a CallerID number to be provided to a destination equipment to identify a callrequester. The process may be implemented on a compliance system. At220, a call and associated caller identification data are received. Ifat 222 it is determined that the caller identification number receivedat 220 matches a monitored call participant's non-public number, at 226the caller identification number is mapped to a public number associatedwith the same monitored call participant and the public number is usedto identify the originator of the call received at 220, e.g., byproviding the public number as a caller identification number in placeof the caller identification number received at 220. If at 222 it isdetermined that the received caller identification number does not matcha monitored call participant's non-public number, at 224 the calleridentification number received at 220 is passed as the calleridentification number.

FIG. 2D is a flow chart illustrating an embodiment of a process forestablishing a call to a destination call number. The process may beimplemented on a device associated with monitored call participant 106of FIG. 1. At 228, the destination number is received. In someembodiments, the destination number may be received from a userassociated with a monitored call participant, e.g., a number entered bythe user using a keypad. At 230, a connection is established to thecompliance system. In some embodiments, a call is made to the compliancesystem using a number associated with the compliance system. In someembodiments, the call to the compliance system is made transparently toa user associated with the monitored call participant. At 232, thedestination number received at 228 is passed to the compliance system.At 234, the process waits for a called participant associated with thedestination number to be conferenced in to the call. Once the calledcall participant has been conferenced in, the call initiator's call tothe destination call number has been established and information can beexchanged between the initiator and the called call participant.

FIG. 2E is a flow chart illustrating an embodiment of a process forblocking a caller. The process may be implemented on a compliance systemor communication equipment associated with a monitored call participant.At 236, a call is received. At 238, the call participants aredetermined. The calling participants are both the call initiator and therequested destination call participant. The call participants may bedetermined using caller identification data, requested destination callnumber, the line on which the call was received, and/or other dataassociated with the call. If at 240 it is determined that the callingparticipants are not allowed to communicate with each other, the call isblocked at 242. In some embodiment, the decision at 240 is governed by ablocking policy, including a list of allowed and/or blocked callparticipants. A call participant may be placed on the list if the callparticipant had previously violated a communication policy. For example,if during a call a communication participant communicates keywords thatviolate the communication policy, the call is terminated and thecommunication participant is placed on a blocked list. Call participantsmay be added or removed from one or more lists by a user withmodification privileges. Blocking a call may include one or more of thefollowing: disconnecting the call, logging data associated with theblocked call request, and generating a notification of the blocked call.If at 240 it is determined that the calling participants are allowed tocommunicate with each other, at 244 the call is permitted.

FIG. 3 is a block diagram illustrating an embodiment of a system forcompliance processing. Compliance system 302 performs complianceprocessing. Storage 304 contains data associated with the compliancesystem. Monitored call participant 306 is one of one or morecommunication participants associated with compliance system 302.Information associated with calls to and from monitored call participant306 is provided to compliance system 302 for processing. External callparticipant 308 is one of one or more communication participants thatmay communicate with monitored call participant 306. More than two callparticipants can exist, e.g., a conference call involving 3 or more callparticipants. The external call participant is external to thecompliance system since the call participant is not directly associatedwith the compliance system. In some embodiments, only informationassociated with calls involving at least one monitored call participantis processed by compliance system 302. In some embodiments, monitoredcall participant 306 may communicate with another monitored callparticipant associated with compliance system 302. The communicationinformation path lines shown in the figure are merely schematic.Information may travel through any path or network and travel throughany intermediary node.

For example, when a call either is made to or from monitored callparticipant 306, compliance system 302 is notified of the call. If aconnection does not already exist between monitored call participant 306and compliance system 302, a connection is established between thembefore a user associated with monitored call participant 306 is able tocommunicate with another call participant. In some embodiments, a callis made to the compliance system before any user communication isallowed, and the compliance system call is conferenced with both theincoming or outgoing call of a monitored call participant. This allowscompliance system 302 to potentially process all informationcommunicated between the call participants. In some embodiments, thecompliance system 302 is not conferenced in to a call to/from monitoredcall participant 306, but equipment associated with monitored callparticipant 306 is configured to mirror, automatically and transparentlyto the user, at least a portion of call data associated with a callto/from call participant 306. In some embodiments, compliance system 302has control over monitored call participant 306. For example, compliancesystem 302 may filter or block communication desired by monitored callparticipant 306. In some embodiments, such filtering and/or blocking isimplemented by providing on equipment associated with monitored callparticipant 306 an agent configured to filter and/or block calls inresponse to control signals sent to the agent by compliance system 302,e.g., as a result of compliance processing performed by compliancesystem 302 with respect to a call.

FIG. 4A is a flow chart illustrating an embodiment of a process forestablishing a call. The process may be implemented on a device, e.g.,telephone equipment, associated with monitored call participant 306 ofFIG. 3. At 402, a called number is received. For example, the callnumber of a destination call participant may be dialed by a userassociated with a monitored call participant. At 404, the compliancesystem is called. At 406, a new call associated with the called numberis conferenced in to the call with the compliance system, allowing thecompliance system to monitor communication between the callparticipants.

FIG. 4B is a flow chart illustrating an embodiment of a process forblocking a call. The process may be implemented on a device associatedwith monitored call participant 306 of FIG. 3. At 408, a call number ofa call participant is received. The call number may be associated with adestination number of an initiated call request or can be associatedwith an incoming call requester's call number. At 410, the compliancesystem is called and the received call number is passed to thecompliance system. At 412, the call authorization is determined. Invarious embodiments, authorization determination may be performed on thecompliance system or on a device associated with the monitored callparticipant. Call authorization includes verifying that the callparticipants are allowed to communicate with one another according to acommunication policy that can be preconfigured and/or dynamicallyconfigured. The authorization determination can be made in part byverifying the received call number as authorized. In some embodiments,the authorization determination is made at a remote compliance systemand 412 includes receiving from the remote compliance system anindication whether the call is authorized. If at 412 it is determinedthat the call is not authorized, the call is blocked at 414. If at 412it is determined that the call is authorized, at 416 the received callnumber is conferenced in to the call placed to the compliance system at410, allowing the compliance system to monitor communication between thecall participants.

FIG. 4C is a flow chart illustrating an embodiment of a process forreceiving a call on a device associated with a monitored callparticipant. The process may be implemented on a device associated withmonitored call participant 306 of FIG. 3. At 418, a call is received ona device associated with a monitored call participant. If at 420 it isdetermined that the call is originating from a compliance system, at 424the user associated with a monitored call participant is notified of thecall. In some embodiments, the compliance system may call the device toconference another call participant together with the device. If at 420it is determined that the call is not originating from a compliancesystem, at 422 a connection with the compliance system is established.In some embodiments, connecting to the compliance system includescalling the compliance system. In some embodiments, connecting to thecompliance system includes conferencing the compliance system in to thecall received at 418. In some embodiments, connecting to the compliancesystem includes passing a calling party number to the compliance systemand receiving an indication whether the call is authorized, as in theprocess of FIG. 4B. At 424, the user associated with the monitored callparticipant is notified of the call.

FIG. 5A is a block diagram illustrating an embodiment of a system forcompliance processing in a PBX environment. Compliance system 502, callstation 1 (506), and call station 2 (508) are connected to PBX system504. Call stations can be any terminal that can be used to communicatewith another communication participant. Any number of call stations mayexist. PBX 504 handles all call routing for all call stations associatedwith the PBX. Calls within call stations associated with the PBX may berouted and handled by the PBX. PBX can also route calls to an externalnetwork connection, e.g., public telephone network. Since the PBXhandles all calls for the call stations, compliance system 502 canmonitor and perform compliance processing on all calls by monitoringcall information routed and handled by the PBX. For example, if anunauthorized call is detected by compliance system 502, compliancesystem 502 can instruct PBX 504 to not allow the call. In someembodiments, PBX 504 is configured to conference the compliance systemin to all (or selected) calls initiated by or placed to call station 1(506) and/or call station 2 (508). In some embodiments, PBX 504 operatesas a normal PBX configured to route a call placed using a public numberassociated with one of the monitored call stations 1 or 2 to thecompliance system 502, which then provides a non-public call number(e.g., internal extension) to PBX 504 to conference in the associatedmonitored call participant (506 or 508, as applicable, in the exampleshown). In some embodiments, PBX 504 operates as a normal PBX and alocal telephone equipment associated with station 1 or 2 (506 and 508),as applicable, is configured to use PBX 504 to conference compliancesystem 502 in to any (or selected) calls initiated or received by theassociated monitored call station. In some embodiments, calls betweenmonitored call stations 506 and 508 are placed using public internalextension that are associated on PBX 504, which is configured to routeall such calls to compliance system 502, which then uses a non-publicextension associated with the dialed public extension to conference inthe intended call recipient. By utilizing an already existing enterprisecontrolled equipment, implementing compliance processing is simplifiedand does not necessarily require that special equipment or services tobe obtained from an external service provider such as a local, regional,mobile, or other telephone service provider.

In some embodiments, compliance processing is performed in a complianceprocessing module that is a part of a call station. Each call stationmay have built-in compliance processing capabilities. A call station maybe connected to an external storage system that can be used duringcompliance processing or a storage unit may be a part of the callstation. A storage system or unit may include any storage medium,including hard drives, optical storage, data tape, audio tape, backupserver, and networked storage (e.g., Storage Area Network, NetworkAttached Storage).

FIG. 5B is a block diagram illustrating an embodiment of a system forcompliance processing in a PBX environment, including line monitors.Compliance system 514, call station 1 (516), and call station 2 (518)are connected to PBX 520. PBX 520 is connected to an external telephonenetwork 524 through line monitors 522. External telephone network can beany telephone network including mobile phone network, public switchedtelephone network, telephone network, and/or Voice-over-IP network. Anynumber of connections to one or more external telephone networks mayexist, and in some embodiments each such connection may one or more linemonitors associated with it. Compliance system 514 is configured in someembodiments to monitor and process all (or selected) calls to and fromany call station associated with the PBX by monitoring call informationpassing through the PBX. In some embodiments, line monitors arephysically remote from the compliance system. Data is exchanged betweenthe line monitors and the compliance system through a connection betweenthem. For example, line monitors may relay line state and ANIinformation to the compliance system. In the event of either linemonitor or compliance system cannot provide monitoring service, linemonitors can interrupt telephony service by being set to fail open orfail closed. Line monitors 522 can be controlled by compliance system514. Line monitors can block, filter, and monitor any information on thecommunication line connection. For example, if a call not authorized bythe compliance system is detected by the line monitors (e.g., when acommunication line is “hot” due to a malicious attempt to bypasscompliance processing), the unauthorized call information can be blockedby the line monitors.

Although the foregoing embodiments have been described in some detailfor purposes of clarity of understanding, the invention is not limitedto the details provided. There are many alternative ways of implementingthe invention. The disclosed embodiments are illustrative and notrestrictive.

1. A method of initiating a communication, comprising: receiving from acalling party an identifier associated with an intended destination withwhich the calling party desires to establish communication; establishingcommunication with a compliance node; and providing the identifier tothe compliance node; wherein the compliance node is configured toestablish with the intended destination a communication session in whichthe compliance node, the intended destination, and the calling party areparticipants.
 2. A method as recited in claim 1, wherein the callingparty includes a user, a hardware component, or a software componentassociated with a monitored call participant.
 3. A method as recited inclaim 1, wherein the identifier is received from a user via a userinterface.
 4. A method as recited in claim 1, wherein communication withthe compliance node is established automatically and the participationof the compliance node in the communication session is transparent tothe calling party.
 5. A method of receiving a communication, comprising:receiving at an equipment associated with a first communicationparticipant a request from a second communication participant toestablish communication; establishing a connection with a compliancenode; allowing communication with the second communication participantto be established; and providing to the compliance node at least aportion of the communication between the first and second communicationparticipants; wherein the compliance node is configured to performcompliance processing with respect to said at least a portion of thecommunication between the first and second communication participantsand communication with the compliance node is established before thefirst and second communication participants are permitted to communicatewith one another.
 6. A method as recited in claim 5, wherein providingto the compliance node at least a portion of the communication betweenthe first and second communication participants includes establishing acommunication session in which the compliance node, the firstcommunication participant, and the second communication participant areparticipants.
 7. A method as recited in claim 5, wherein providing tothe compliance node at least a portion of the communication between thefirst and second communication participants includes mirroring to thecompliance node said at least a portion of the communication between thefirst and second communication participants.
 8. A method as recited inclaim 5, wherein the compliance node is a compliance module implementedon the equipment.
 9. A method as recited in claim 5, whereinestablishing a connection with the compliance node includes establishinga new to call an external compliance system.
 10. A method as recited inclaim 5, wherein compliance processing includes one or more of:monitoring, recording, archiving, indexing, retrieving, analyzing,controlling, blocking, and modifying communication information.
 11. Amethod as recited in claim 5, wherein the communication comprises one ormore of the following: voice data including conversation content andtone/character/accent/gender of voice, background call noise, dataassociated with devices of with call participants, data associated withcommunication service providers, data associated with routing devices,data associated with other devices associated with a compliance system,and any audible or binary data associated with the call.
 12. A method asrecited in claim 5, wherein compliance processing includes blocking ormodifying the communication according to a call blocking policy based atleast in part on one or more of the following: a list of allowed callparticipants, a list of non-allowed call participants, a list of allowedcall participant groupings, and a list of non-allowed call participantgroups.
 13. A method as recited in claim 5, wherein complianceprocessing includes storing data associated with the communicationaccording to an archive policy on a storage medium.
 14. A method asrecited in claim 13, wherein the storage medium includes one or more ofthe following: a hard drive, optical storage, a data tape, an audiotape, a backup server, a networked storage, a Storage Area Network, anda Network Attached Storage.
 15. A method as recited in claim 13, whereinstoring data further includes one or more of the following: informationconversion, audio digitalization, voice to text translation, encodingformat conversion, data filtering, data compression, and dataencryption.
 16. A method as recited in claim 5, wherein the equipmentincludes one or more of the following: a mobile phone, a telephone, acomputer, and any device able to send and receive data at least in partvia a telephone service provider network.
 17. A method of initiating acommunication, comprising: receiving from a calling party at anequipment associated with the calling party an identifier associatedwith an intended destination with which the calling party wants toestablish communication; establishing a connection with a compliancenode; establishing communication with the intended destination; andproviding to the compliance node at least a portion of the communicationbetween the calling party and the intended destination; wherein thecompliance node is configured to perform compliance processing withrespect to said at least a portion of the communication between thecalling party and the intended destination and communication with thecompliance node is established before the calling party and the intendeddestination are permitted to communicate with one another.
 18. A methodas recited in claim 17, wherein providing to the compliance node atleast a portion of the communication between the calling party and theintended destination includes establishing a communication session inwhich the compliance node, the calling party, and the intendeddestination are participants.
 19. A method as recited in claim 17,wherein providing to the compliance node at least a portion of thecommunication between the calling party and the intended destinationincludes mirroring to the compliance node said at least a portion of thecommunication between the calling party and the intended destination.20. A communication equipment, comprising: a user interface configuredto receive an identifier associated with an intended destination withwhich a calling party desires to establish communication; and acommunication interface configured to communicate with a compliance nodeand transmit the identifier to the compliance node; wherein thecompliance node is configured to establish with the intended destinationa communication session in which the compliance node, the intendeddestination, and the calling party are participants and thecommunication equipment is configured to establish communication withother communication participants only indirectly through the compliancenode.
 21. A communication equipment, comprising: a communicationinterface configured to initiate telephonic calls placed by and receivetelephonic calls placed to a communication participant associated withthe communication equipment; and a compliance module configured toperform compliance processing with respect to telephonic calls placed byor to the communication participant; wherein compliance processingincludes or more of: monitoring, recording, archiving, indexing,retrieving, analyzing, controlling, blocking, and modifyingcommunication information.
 22. An equipment as recited in claim 21,further comprising a data storage configured to store data associatedwith the compliance processing.
 23. An equipment as recited in claim 21,wherein the equipment comprises a telephone, mobile phone, VoIP device,or other telephonic equipment.
 24. A computer program product forreceiving a communication, the computer program product being embodiedin a computer readable medium and comprising computer instructions for:receiving at an equipment associated with a first communicationparticipant a request from a second communication participant toestablish communication; accepting communication from the secondcommunication participant; and performing at the equipment complianceprocessing with respect to at least a portion of the communicationbetween the first and second communication participants.
 25. A computerprogram product as recited in claim 24, wherein compliance processingincludes-one or more of: monitoring, recording, archiving, indexing,retrieving, analyzing, controlling, blocking, and modifyingcommunication information.
 26. A computer program product as recited inclaim 24, wherein compliance processing includes blocking or modifyingthe communication according to a call blocking policy based at least inpart on one or more of the following: a list of allowed callparticipants, a list of non-allowed call participants, a list of allowedcall participant groupings, and a list of non-allowed call participantgroups.
 27. A computer program product as recited in claim 24, whereincompliance processing includes storing data associated with thecommunication according to an archive policy on a storage medium.